Military families and service members will have fewer options for picking up and dropping off their vehicles for shipment to and from OCONUS duty stations starting May 1.
Eight of the current 46 vehicle processing centers will be closing, with four of those overseas.
That will mean longer drives for stateside vehicle pick-up and drop-off for many families.
The change comes as Defense Transportation Command moves to a new contractor to manage the process and save some money. Closing the eight centers will save the department as much as $9 million a year, says Mitch Chandran, a spokesman for the command.
Closing stateside are four locations -- Edison, N.J., New Orleans, La., Orlando, Fla., and Oakland, Calif. Users who would've otherwise gone to those locations will instead need to send their vehicle to or, if heading overseas, drop it off at a different, further away facility.
The ones that will remain open stateside are: Atlanta, Ga., Baltimore, Md., Charleston, S.C., Dallas, Texas, Los Angeles, Calif., Norfolk, Va., Seattle, Wa., St. Louis, Mo. and San Diego, Calif.
The four locations that are closing OCONUS are RAF Croughton and Menwith Hill, England, Mannheim, Germany and Seville, Spain.
This change will have the most impact on families in Florida, the Northeast and California. Atlanta, Ga. and Los Angeles, Calif., for example, are a solid six to eight hour drive respectively from the closing locations in Orlando, Fla. and Oakland, Calif. That's quite the road trip when you're trying to settle in from or get ready for an overseas PCS.
Chandran said that, other than these few closings, the transition to the new contractor shouldn't be noticeable.
"This whole transition is going to be seamless to the servicemembers – there's nothing they have to be worried about," he said.
You can see a complete list of the current locations and the closing locations both stateside and OCONUS here.
